The technology, integrated into the college’s Symmetry Financials accounting system, has also freed-up document storage space and eliminated document archiving costs.
Paul Allison, finance manager at Lincoln College, said: “With 60 cost centres and eight different sites, obtaining invoice approvals used to be extremely time-consuming and involved one person placing a stamp on the invoice and another physically signing it off. After merging with Newark College, which is situated 20 miles away, we experienced further invoice approval delays due to invoices going missing in the internal post. We also used to incur substantial costs through printing, photocopying and posting documents back-and-forth between the different sites.”
The new system can be accessed by up to 70 authorised Lincoln College staff across three different sites. With Version One, purchase invoices are scanned in, imaged and then automatically linked to the appropriate record in the college’s accounting system. Authorised staff are now able to view invoices on their PCs rather than having to spend time manually locating them.
The college’s old approval process required invoices to be posted and manually signed. Invoices can now be approved, rejected or queried on screen.
“Version One’s software is very reliable and easy to use. As well as eliminating lost and misfiled invoices, DbArchive has transformed our purchase-to-pay cycle by reducing the time it takes to approve an invoice by four days, helping to avoid late payment charges. Version One’s software has also freed-up document storage space and has saved us thousands of pounds as we no longer have to pay a third party supplier to scan and archive our documents. In addition, staff are now free to concentrate on more value-adding activities instead of time-consuming manual procedures,” said Allison.
Using Version One’s DbArchive has resulted in a reduction in the amount of paper being printed and photocopied during the approval process.
Allison said: “Colleges are under increasing pressure from the Government to cut carbon emissions and make significant efficiency savings and so this was an important consideration when choosing Version One. Since implementing DbArchive, staff no longer have to print out and photocopy invoices several times over which has dramatically reduced our environmental impact.”
Lincoln College is based over two sites, one in Lincoln City Centre and another in Gainsborough. It is the largest educational institution in the county. It offers over 450 vocational and 50 academic programmes to around 9,000 students of whom 2,500 are full-time. It recently merged with Newark and Sherwood College, now re-named Newark College.
